A single-room occupancy hotel does not have to be bleak.

The Belleclaire is a single-room occupancy hotel at 250 West 77th Street.

The Grand is now a single-room occupancy hotel, with 348 rooms above a string of jewelry and import dealers on the street.

In the last two decades, the district has seen a proliferation of nursing homes and single-room occupancy hotels for people on welfare and the homeless.

A1 San Diego is fighting homelessness by making it profitable for private developers to build and operate single-room occupancy hotels.

In the last two years, the city has lost more than 1,200 units in single-room occupancy hotels to fires and conversions to apartments.

Some of the money goes toward single-room occupancy hotels, which shelter single adults.

The hotel is covered by a city moratorium on the demolition or conversion of single-room occupancy hotels.

Residents fear such structures because the neighborhood contains so many low-rent buildings and single-room occupancy hotels that are tempting to developers.

Two single-room occupancy hotels have been cleared and construction is set to begin in February and finish in the autumn of 2000.